John Sidney McCain III wasborn on 29 August 1936 in Coco Solo, near Colón, in the Panama Canal Zone. He would later graduate from the U.S. Naval Academy and serve as a naval officer in the U.S. Navy, as both his father and grandfather had before him.

He was an A-4 Skyhawk pilot during the Vietnam War and was shot down over North Vietnam on 26 October 1967. McCain was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam until 14 March 1973 and retired from the U.S. Navy in 1981. He served in the U.S. House and Senate from 1983, from the state of Arizona, until his death in 2018.